Insights and behind the scenes from our palaces
A Model of Queenship: Lady Elizabeth's Summer with Katherine Parr
20 September 2024
Tracy Borman travels back to 1544, when Elizabeth spent a happy summer at Hampton Court Palace watching her beloved stepmother, Katherine Parr act as Regent. This visit would have an enduring impact on the young princess.
Conservation and discoveries in our paper collections
06 February 2020
We have around 25,000 works of art on paper in Historic Royal Palaces' collection. While many are on display, the vast majority are held in storage. These are delicate items and it's essential to conserve and store them correctly in order to preserve them for posterity.
Six mattresses for a Queen: Secrets of a State Bed
30 January 2020
As conservation work continues on Queen Caroline's State bed, Conservator Beatrice Farmer shares discoveries on the lavish silk-covered mattresses, including one that appears to be an impostor. The bed is part of the Royal Collection, and can usually be found on display at Hampton Court Palace.
A discovery on the lining: Secrets of A State Bed
08 January 2020
Queen Caroline's state bed has three upper inner valances. These decorative drapes are attached to the inside the wooden bed frame, to hide the bed frame and give a decorative border to the tester or canopy. They are made from silk damask decorated with silk braid and lined with plain silk. Linings are not usually the most exciting or important part of a textile, but these ones turned out to be far more interesting than we thought.
Mistletoe in the Hampton Court Palace Gardens
20 December 2019
One of the most popular questions posed to our gardeners during winter concerns strange lumps of weed growing in trees in the East Front garden. These random and odd-looking growths are in fact clumps of mistletoe.
New life for the glasshouse at Hillsborough Castle
20 December 2019
It's been an exceptionally busy year for the gardens team at Hillsborough Castle, with the doors to the extensive estate thrown open to the public every day for the first time. Time has also been found to transform the glasshouse, a modest but attractive corner of the gardens that had long been overlooked.
The art of botanical watercolours: meet the Hampton Court Florilegium Society
06 December 2019
One of the newer collections in the Historic Royal Palaces archives is a large group of botanical watercolours, on both paper and vellum, painted by the Hampton Court Florilegium society. The society aims to establish an archive of botanically accurate paintings and drawings of the plants that are growing in the palace gardens each year.
Festooned with Mystery: Wall Paintings at the Banqueting House
07 November 2019
An investigation into some mysterious mural paintings in the Banqueting House took place with a scaffold built for conservators to inspect the often overlooked wall paintings just beneath the magnificent ceiling.
The colourful history of the cornices and corbels: Secrets of a State Bed
06 November 2019
As conservation work continues on Queen Caroline's State bed, Conservator Beatrice Farmer describes the small details and considerations involved in conserving the textile elements of the bed such as the cornices and corbels - from how to remove old patches to finding the best materials and colours to match the original item.
Excavations at the Tower of London's chapel
21 October 2019
Earlier this year, once-in-a-generation excavation works taking place outside the entrance to the Tower's Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula uncovered amazing finds, which shed new light on the history of the Chapel and what life was like for those who lived at the Tower 500 years ago. Historic Buildings Curator Alfred Hawkins explains the process of archaeological excavations.